Health Reform is a Civil Rights Issue

Author : Toni Bigby

Consumer Advocacy at CareSource Over 11 years of experience working with Ohio’s Medicaid program promoting the importance and availability of health care coverage for Ohio’s underserved populations; Responsible for working with statewide consumer advocacy groups to advance key initiatives to provide value-added benefits to CareSource members; Charged with engaging members to bring their voice to the forefront to inform internal business operations

Jan 18th, 2010 | by Toni Bigby

Martin Luther King, if he had been given the time, must eventually have tackled the health care issue as an essential civil right.  As a nation, we’ve focused so much on the tactics and details—public options, mandates, “Cadillac plans” and so on—that we may be forgetting why increasing health care accessibility is important to us as a nation.

So this is just a reminder for all of us: without health care, personal growth and success are limited indeed.  Children with sensory or behavioral problems are not treated, or whose simple illnesses are not cared for, cannot learn.  Adults with a chronic disease (like diabetes or asthma) can earn a living—but only if they have the care and medications they need.  Families that lose a parent to a disease that could have been cured if caught earlier, suffer consequences that can hardly be measured – stability, opportunity, potential.

If we are serious about equal opportunity, education, stable families, social justice at any level, we must embrace health care accessibility as an essential civil right.

Can We Wait Until 2014?

Author : Chris Whistler

Vice President, Government Affairs at CareSource Over 15 years of experience in public policy and finance, with a focus on the Medicaid program. Responsible for working with policymakers to ensure that they understand the benefits CareSource brings to our members and to taxpayers, and for leading advocacy for legislative and programmatic changes that enable CareSource to better serve our members.

Oct 14th, 2009 | by Chris Whistler

The US Senate Finance Committee just approved a health care plan that includes a provision that would significantly expand Medicaid. This is great on so many levels. However, it has one flaw. That being, the full expansion wouldn’t actually start until 2014. Is it just me, or does that seem to contradict the whole idea of protecting the most vulnerable first?
Yes, it’s true that we’ve been trying to fix the health care system since at least 1948. So from one point of view, spending another few years trying to get it right doesn’t seem out of line. But imagine if all you hear around you is that health care reform is going to make a difference in the lives of the 47 million uninsured Americans right now, but then you find out that you have to wait longer than everybody else. Then, to make matters worse, your income is among the lowest in America and is the primary reason you are uninsured in the first place.
The unfortunate truth about this health care plan is that once again, those who are most in need are expected to wait longer than the rest of us. This includes hard working people with low incomes who just don’t happen to have dependent children – the current ticket for most people to qualify for Medicaid. And parents who are doing all they can to make ends meet for their children who are blocked from Medicaid coverage because their very limited income is deemed too high for them to qualify. The list goes on.
Where’s the justice in waiting to expand Medicaid until 2014? Or, maybe more pragmatically, where is the preventive care and coordination that is going to enable the right care at the right time in the right setting – you know, rather than causing the first stop to be in an emergency room after waiting until the cancer spreads, the diabetes worsens, or the heart attack occurs.
Doesn’t it make sense to have health care coverage for those that need it most first?

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